Volcanoes killed dinosaurs? That's what a new study suggests.
Volcanoes in what is now India may have killed off the dinosaurs, as opposed to an asteroid. The researchers believe that lava from the volcanic region of Deccan Traps near Mumbai, caused poisonous sulfur and carbon dioxide to enter the atmosphere which led to global warming and ocean acidification and killed off the dinosaurs, according to LiveScience.com.
These results were presented at the American Geophysical Union on Wednesday. There has been a longtime debate over whether an asteroid or volcanoes killed the dinosaurs in what is being called the K-T extinction.
"Our new information calls for a reassessment of what really caused the K-T mass extinction," Gerta Keller, a geologist at Princeton University who conducted the study told LiveScience.com. Keller has believed that volcanoes were to blame for many years.
The volcano vs. asteroid debate goes on though. According to the Alvarez hypothesis, a giant meteorite hit Chicxulub, Mexico 65 million years ago. This event cause toxic dust and gas to enter the atmosphere and blocked out the sun. This toxicity led to cooling of the earth, poisoning of sea life, and choking of the dinosaurs. According to the hypothesis, this meteorite may have also set off volcanic activity, earthquakes and tsunamis.
Keller disagrees with this hypothesis. she argues that the chemical components of the asteroid showed up after the dinosaurs were already extinct. She also believes that this meteorite crash wouldn't have produced the level of toxic sulfur and carbon dioxide that was found in the rocks in the area. With this, she believes the meteorite could have made the extinction worse, but she doubts that it caused it.
Keller's team got their findings from lava-filled sediments that were uncovered by oil companies that were drilling in Eastern India in 2009. They got permission to examine the sediments and found they contained fossils from the period in which the dinosaurs went extinct.
The sediment showed that the lava traveled 1,000 miles from the Deccan Traps. They found evidence that suggested both land and sea creatures died off shortly after the eruptions took place.
Eric Font, a geologist at the University of Lisbon in Portugal, agrees with the more recent findings, saying it "really demonstrates that we have Deccan Traps just before the mass extinction, and that may contribute partially or totally to the mass extinction."
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
